Influence of Cellulose Nanoparticles on Structure and Electrophysical Properties of Ferroelectrics

Abstract

In present work, a comparative study on electrophysical properties of two ferroelectric nanocomposites based on cellulose nanoparticles (CNP) mixed with Rochelle salt (RS) and sodium nitrite (NaNO₂) at different composition mass ratios was conducted to clarify the influence of cellulose on dielectric properties of primitive ferroelectrics. The composites were carefully characterized XRD and FTIR techniques. The experiments were carried out in a wide temperature range under a weak electric field with an amplitude of 2 V/cm at 1 kHz. The obtained results revealed that at relatively high cellulose content, the phase transition temperature of Rochelle salt in the composite increased, while for sodium nitrite – decreased as compared to those of volume ferroelectrics. Besides, the higher the cellulose content was, the stronger the shift of phase transition point was observed. At small cellulose content, the Curie point characteristic for volume ferroelectrics occurred. The intermolecular hydrogen bonds and size effects were supposed to be responsible for the observed anomalies.

Fig. 4 Temperature dependences of dielectric constant and dielectric loss tangent for (a), (b) CNP/RS and (c), (d) CNP/NaNO₂ composites at different composition mass ratios. The results of cellulose were also added for comparison. T_dec – decomposition temperature of RS. The insets – for polycrystalline RS (a), (b) and NaNO₂ (c), (d).